A Different Set of Heroes
by Cececat
Summary: A series of two-shots in which Brad & Janet are replaced by a variety of famous people from the 20th century and before. A variety of performers (including some actors from the RHPS), writers, Ancient Romans... Rated 'M' for obvious reasons. (Please Read & Review)


**Disclaimer: I don't own _The Rocky Horror Picture Show_**

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 **A/N: I know, I've begun quite a few stories lately. This one is more likely to be finished. It's more like a miniseries of similar stories than one story. Each story will be basically _RHPS_ with two random famous people standing in for Brad & Janet. Most of the time there will be at least one RHPS-related person. Part 1 is Richard O'Brien & William Shakespeare, for example. Though the stories should make sense to people who haven't heard of the so-called famous people. **

**I've been trying to be 'historically accurate' about this. 'Fictionalized Richard O'Brien' refers to _RHS_ as _They Came From Denton High_ and doesn't know some of the songs because of when he was summoned from. That's also why Shakespeare's dialogue is so awful (sorry about that).**

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 _I would like, if I may, to take you on a strange journey..._

It seemed a fairly ordinary night for both heroes of our story. One - a certain William Shakespeare - was sitting in his study in the year 1611. He was writing a play about fairies and Ancient Greeks. Quite a peculiar combination indeed. The other - another playwright, though one of a more recent time- was reading through drafts of his musical. It happened to be May of 1973... only about a month before said musical opened at the Royal Court Theatre. He, as you've most likely guessed, was named Richard Smith (but went by the stage name 'Richard O'Brien).

Suddenly, the both of them were transported to another world. 'Twas a world characterized by its logic (well, its lack of _sensible_ logic).

A world, dear reader, in which b-movies were real...

They didn't notice each other at first. No, they both were busy trying to figure out why they were in front of that weird castle and why they wore these strange new clothes. Well, only Will wore different clothes. His Elizabethan outfit wouldn't look right in this peculiar new setting.

Then they finally noticed each other.

"Who the devil are you?" shrieked Will.

"Who the fuck are you?" the other man shouted, at the same time.

After glaring at each other for a moment, Will pathetically asked: "I believe a better question, goodly sir, is _'where_ the hell are we'?"

"The Frankenstein place," Richard quickly replied.

Will raised an eyebrow. "You know it?"

"I think so."

Again, there was awkward silence. Richard spoke first.

"For some reason I think we'd better both go inside..."

Since there really wasn't a reason not to do this, Will nodded. "Aye, that sounds good. By the way, I'm Will."

"Good to meet you, I'm Richard O'Brien," replied his companion.

The two playwrights then carefully walked to the door of the creepy old house. Will was the one who actually knocked. Quite soon, a rather stoned looking half-bald man wearing bloodstained butler's attire opened the creaky old door.

"Hello," said he.

"Greetings," Richard replied.

"Another guest of the Master's... aren't you?" the butler asked.

Wanting to see the inside of the house, Will lied. "Indeed."

The butler smiled a strange smile. "I think you'd better both... come inside."

"Or die inside, if their be some attractive representative of the fairer sex in this house for me to die inside of. If not, perchance I'd die atop a handsome lad," Will replied.

This confused everyone else for a moment. Nobody in the universe had a mind as dirty as his - nor did anybody in more recent times understand the outdated slang he used. At first. Though they might've figured it out quicker if they'd known that somebody could say such disgustingly dirty things aloud!

Once they'd entered the house - in which Will hoped he could later enter nothing, as he kept saying quite lewdly - the two playwrights became oddly solemn. In this brighter lighting they could more easily see each other and that evil-looking butler.

"He looks like you!" Will hissed.

Richard didn't respond in any way to that. No, he was too busy gaping at this foyer they'd ended up in. It was just... wow. Like something out of an old b-picture, the sort his new musical satirized. Now he was beginning to get excited – not in _that_ way, mind you – about it all. Being in one of those stories! It was like a Trekkie getting to tour the _Enterprise_ or a scholar of ancient Rome going back in time to meet Gaius Octavius Caesar! Or like a playwright meeting William Shakespeare… _if_ that playwright knew much about the classics. Richard did not.

"This way," the butler said.

Music played from another room. The two playwrights heard it loud and clear.

"Are you hosting a party of some kind?" Will asked.

"It's one of the master's affairs,"

"Oh, lucky him," Richard said sarcastically.

Then, they heard a wild laugh. Only then did those two notice a woman leaning over the nearby stairway's banister. With an impish smile she slid down the banister, gleefully shouting:

"He's lucky... you're lucky... I'm lucky... we're ALL lucky! Ha!"

Now, Will was staring at her.

"Lucky am I to come across such a pretty creature as you."

"What do you want from her?" the butler asked, clearly annoyed.

"Nothing, that's what. As a man of at least a certain age, you - goodly sir! - should know that. Don't play the fool, for it fits you not. Do you disagree that this pretty creature would not benefit from a proper introduction to my wit? I would benefit from getting to know her, at the very least."

Everyone stared at him with varying levels of confusion. The banister-girl was the first to understand this strange speech, then the butler. Finally...

"That's... revolting," Richard said quietly.

Understandably, the girl nodded in agreement. The butler _would've_ nodded to if the Time Warp wasn't beginning.

"I know this song," Richard muttered.

" _Not for very much longer!"_

" _I've got to keep control... I remember doing the time warp_!"

"I remember writing it!"

" _Drinking those moments when... the blackness would hit me..."_

" _And the void would be calling_!"

Then, Will and Richard were chased by the odd servants into a ballroom. There stood many party guests, all dressed quite oddly.

" _Let's do the time warp again! Let's do the time warp again_!"

An odd voice that seemed to have no specific source then said: " **It's just a jump to the left**!"

"Then a step to the ri-i-i-ight!"

" **With your hands on your hips!** "

" _You bring your knees in tight! But it's the pelvic thrust… that really drives you insay-ay-ay-ane! Let's do the time warp again_!"

By then, Will was dancing and singing with these crazy people. Richard was just gaping in confusion. This was that play he'd been working on not hours before! _They Came From Denton High_ , it was called. Somehow he'd ended up in the play with this weirdo named Will. That was not a good thing…

"Which of us is Brad and which Janet?" he muttered to himself.

Since they both happened to be men much less straitlaced than Richard's characters they probably weren't either.

Will was having fun, at least. For an Elizabethan he'd sure adapted to the 20th century pretty quickly. No wonder people said he was 'for every age'.

Richard was so lost in thought that he didn't notice the time warp beginning and another song beginning. Only when he heard William shriek in fear did he realize…

"How _do_ you do?" said a man who now stood near the doorway.

He wore a vampire cape and way too much makeup. Despite the he still seemed as charismatic as Bela Lugosi's portrayal of Count Dracula.

" _Don't get strung out, by the way I look… don't judge a book by its cover. I'm not much of a man by the light of day… but by night I'm one hell of a lover_!"

Away went the vampirish cape. Now all the guests could see the deranged collection of woman's underclothes he somehow looked so – oh dear, that wasn't a good thing to think about…

It was clearly Tim's character. Unlike Tim, though, this guy hadn't bleached his hair blond. The voice though… god, it was so creepy. It was a weirdly fake voice – like an extremely decadent version of you're stereotypical BBC Brit – that also sort of seduced you. Richard didn't like the idea of being seduced by people he made up. That was awkward.

Now there was a break in the song. Where Brad asks for a phone.

"Frank. You're name is Frank," Richard said.

"Do you know him?" Will asked.

"Sort of," Richard replied nervously.

"I wish to know him. Despite his odd manner of dress – nay, _because_ of his odd manner of dress – he looks like the sort everyone would want to know."

Frank stared at them as if he were mad, then started singing again.

Nobody bothered correcting him.

" _How 'bout that? Well, babies, don't you panic! By the light of the night it'll all seem alright. I'll get you a satanic mechanic… I'm just a sweeeet Transvestite. From Transsexual… Transylvania_ …"

Then, he sat down on his throne again. His odd servants crowded around him.

"Why don't you stay for the night?" Frank asked. "Or maybe a bite?"

"Of what, pray tell?" Will asked.

Frank ignored that peculiar question. "I could show you my faaavorite obsession. I've been making a man with blonde hair and a tan… and he's _goood_ for… relieving my... tension."

Again Frank got up from where he sat.

 _"I'm just a sweet transvestite… from Transsexual… Transylvania. Haha_."

Then, the odd man walked towards the doorway again. The two playwrights then noticed the elevator. Of course, one of them (Will) didn't know what an elevator was.

"So! Come up to the lab! And see what's on the slab. I see you shiver with antici-"

Will was rather confused by all this. What were 'he 'lab' and the 'slab'? And why did the odd man only say half the word 'anticipation'?

-pation."

There, he'd said the whole word. Good.

After a saying a few more strange things, Frank went up the elevator. This futuristic tech shocked William. He'd only ever seen such devices operated by stagehands, via ropes! But there weren't any stagehands nearby. It just… worked.

"That's an elevator, before you ask. What's your full name, Will?" Richard asked, beginning to wonder who this weird guy was.

"William Shakespeare."

" _WHAT_?" Richard was so shocked he didn't even notice Magenta taking his clothes away. Will noticed his own clothes being stolen by Columbia, but didn't comment.

"Yes, why does that upset you so?" Will asked.

"Are you really Shakespeare? Isn't he a bit… dead… by the 20th century?"

"Perhaps. But to me it's the year 1608, which isn't the 20th century at all."

"It's 1974," Riff Raff corrected.

"1973," argued Richard. "I think."

Then, they went up to the lab. To see what was on the slab. Of course, Richard already knew…

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"What do _you_ think of him? Will? Richard?" Frank asked, after the creation had been 'born'.

.

Will grinned, then spoke quite eloquently:

"S _ometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,_

 _And often is his gold complexion dimm'd,_

 _And every fair from fair sometime declines,_

 _By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm'd:_

 _But thy eternal summer shall not fade.._."

"Is that a... nice thing?" Frank asked, after a moment.

"Of course. It's a little bit of verse I just invented upon seeing this fair youth. Fairer than Adonis, I do think!"

Richard cleared his throat nervously. "Right…"

Frank hadn't expected such a reaction. No, normal people usually recoiled in fear when they met a Frankenstein's monster. At least in all the earthling movies he'd seen. Though the creatures in the movies were often much uglier.

"Whether you like him or not, he's _mine_. I made him for me!" Frank proclaimed theatrically.

Then, came a song Richard didn't recognize. Maybe this wasn't just like the play. It _did_ have different dialogue sometimes – and even different scenery. Though this place was more realistic than what they'd been doing at the Royal Court Theatre Upstairs. For one thing, they had pretty much no budget and very pathetic costumes. This was the 'real thing', so of _course_ it wasn't all really fake!

The odd new song was only half over when there was a very loud 'beeping' sound. Then, a giant walk in freezer – much more impressive than that random soda cooler that O'Hagan fell out of in the show – opened up.

The pink-haired girl (Columbia) shrieked "Eddie!"

A chubby young man on a motorbike rode out of the freezer.

And _another_ song began.

" _Whatever happened to Saturday night? When you're dressed up sharp and you felt alright? It don't seem the same since cosmic light came into my life an' I thought I was divine. I used to go for a ride with a chick who'd go and listen to the music on the radio… a saxophone was blowin' on a rock n' roll show…"_

Richard knew this one, thankfully. He'd actually planned to sing it in _They Came From Denton High_ … until Jim decided that he'd be better as Riff Raff. Since Richard had written the song for himself he knew it pretty well. So he quietly sang along with it.

At that point Will had somehow managed to end up on that balcony or whatever with the unconventional conventionalists and was currently participating in their weird chorus line. It was quite funny, actually.

Things were suddenly less funny when Richard noticed Frank go into the freezer and retrieve an ice pick. The look on the mad scientist's face made _Richard's_ creepily pale face become even paler.

Oh _shit_.

Frank was going to kill poor Eddie. Of course, that _was_ how the story went. Though that didn't make it less wrong.

Even Will suddenly sobered. Though to _him_ this display of violence didn't seem so bad, since he'd lived through plague outbreaks and witnessed lots of other horrid things that just sort of happen to London. That's where all his comedic gravediggers and other gallows humor originated.

"One from the vaults!" Frank proclaimed happily.

A few people laughed nervously. Richard, on the other hand, was still in some sort of shock. This was his creation – his character! Now it didn't seem so funny. When you're on the outside it's okay. It's a joke, a game. But when you're _in_ the story…

Richard shuddered, not wanting to think about it. Another song – an unfamiliar one – started up. The mad scientist and his creature retreated into their so-called bridal suite.

Act 1 was over. As playwrights, both Richard and Will knew this. It's sort of a knack. They know when the first act ends, the next begins… and when the curtain falls for good.

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